COVID-19 Media Interviews: Share Your Thoughts

By Gerard Braud, CSP, Fellow IEC 

The COVID-19 coronavirus crisis has spawned new aspects of crisis communications and media interviews. Behold, the social distancing media interview done from your computer in your home.

What do you think about these interviews?

Your assignment for the day is to:

1. Watch TV
2. Take a photo of an interview being done from home
3. Critique how the interview looks
4. Send your image and your critique to me at any of my platforms, and feel free to include the hashtag #TVInterviews

Here are some criteria to look for and to comment on:

1. Camera angle
2. Lighting
3. Background
4. Glare
5. Distractions
6. Posture
7. …plus anything else that you observe that your professional colleagues should either duplicate or avoid.

Share them via:

@gbraud on Twitter

Gerard Braud on LinkedIn

The BraudCast on YouTube

Braud Communications on Facebook

After you share your observations, I’ll share them back with our community so you’ll be better prepared if you or one of your team members is called upon to do a television interview via your computer from home.

Should you need in-depth training, we can provide you with remote media training for remote interviews as well as train-the-trainer remote training so you can coach your executives and subject matter experts. To learn more, schedule a call: https://calendly.com/braud/15min

Many of the techniques you have learned in traditional media training still apply. Yet, at the same time, there are some clear distinctions and additional burdens. Think of it this way: In a traditional television interview, the news crew is responsible for things you never need to think about, such as:

• lighting
• audio quality
• the background view
• background noise
• the camera angle
• and more

Whereas you traditionally needed to focus on:

• what you were going to say
• your wardrobe
• your body language
• and more

Suddenly, you have to do both your job and their job.

It isn’t easy. I’ll work on a checklist for all of you, but by all means, if you need professional training we’re here to be your training partner.

Crisis communications and media training expert Gerard Braud, CSP, Fellow IEC is based in New Orleans. Organizations on five continents have relied on him to write their crisis communications plans and to train their spokespeople. He is the author of “Don’t Talk to the Media Until…”

More crisis communications articles:

How to Use Social Media for Crisis Communications

The Biggest Lie in Crisis Communications

4 Steps Every Company Needs to Take in Order to Avoid the Default Spokesperson

Photo by Sam McGhee on Unsplash